Today's mountain music comes from A.P. and the Carter Family singing "The Cyclone of Rye Cove," which was recorded shortly after the 1929 tornado that struck Rye Cove School. The Encyclopedia Virginia has this article of the tragic and deadly event:

The Rye Cove Cyclone is the deadliest tornado in Virginia history. Part of an unusual outbreak of tornadoes across the eastern United States on May 2, 1929, it hit the Rye Cove School in the Appalachian highlands of Scott County in the southwestern part of the state, killing twelve students and one teacher and injuring fifty-four. Tornadoes also hit two school houses in Bath County later that day, but both schools had already dismissed students for the day. Scott County native A. P. Carter, of the singing group the Carter Family, volunteered to help in the wake of the tragedy, and the group recorded "The Cyclone of Rye Cove" later that year. The school's 1929–1930 term was canceled, and a memorial school dedicated in 1930.

The unusually violent storm roared up the narrow valley and struck the Rye Cove community at one o'clock in the afternoon on May 2, 1929. The schoolhouse, a seven-room, two-story building, was directly in its path. The principal, Floyd Noblin, told a reporter for the Scott County Herald-Virginian that it all happened without warning. "I was walking through the hall when I saw what looked like a whirlwind coming up the hollow," Noblin said. "Trees were swaying. As it neared the school building it became a black cloud … I think I yelled. It struck the building. The next thing I remembered I was standing knee deep in a pond 75 feet from where the building stood before it was demolished."High school teacher Elizabeth Richmond told the Kingsport Times that "the building collapsed with a smash" just a few seconds after the wind started to howl. There was no opportunity to take cover. Afterward, those who were able carried the dead and injured to nearby houses and barns, but the wind and rain made their task a difficult one. Twelve students, ranging in age from six to eighteen, were killed, along with one instructor, Mary Ava Carter, a twenty-four-year-old first-grade teacher and a recent graduate of Radford State Teachers College. Her body was found seventy-five yards from the school.After the disaster, a relief train took some of the injured to Clinchport for treatment. Others were taken by ambulance to Bristol and Kingsport, Tennessee. The road out of Rye Cove was narrow and twisting, and only partly paved, so getting survivors out and relief workers in was difficult. Among those who rushed to Rye Cove to help was Scott County native A. P. Carter, a member of the country music trio the Carter Family and a prolific songwriter. He was in the next valley on the day of the storm. Carter was touched by the horror of what he saw and soon composed a song, "The Cyclone of Rye Cove." The Carter Family recorded the tune that same year for RCA Victor.The Annual Report of the Superintendent of Public Instruction for 1928–1929 included a few facts about the school: fifty students were enrolled in the high school (twenty-eight boys, twenty-two girls; six of the graduating seniors went to college). There were three high school teachers, with an average monthly salary of $123. One hundred students were enrolled in the elementary grades, and there were four elementary school teachers, with an average monthly salary of $70. There were three hundred books in the school library. The rest of the columns in the report for that year are blank, except for the words, "School and records destroyed by storm." The State Department of Education dispatched a photographer a week after the cyclone to document the school's destruction. The Rye Cove Memorial High School opened in the autumn of 1930, and a memorial plaque naming the thirteen storm victims was placed on the building.

Along with the information above from the Encyclopedia Virginia, an article from the Kingsport Times can be found here, along with an article from the Scott County Herald here. Photographs capturing the aftermath of the tornado can be seen here.

Oh listen today in a story I tell In Sadness and tear dimmed eyes Of a dreadful cyclone that came this way And blew our schoolhouse away Rye Cove (Rye Cove) Rye Cove (Rye Cove) The place of my childhood and home Where in life's early morn I once loved to roam But now it's so silent and lone When the cyclone appeared it darkened the air Yet the lightning flashed over the sky And the children all cried "don't take us away And spare us to go back home" There were mothers so dear and fathers the same That came to this horrible scene Searching and crying each found their own child Dying on a pillow of stone Oh give us a home far beyond the blue skies Where storms and cyclones are unknown And there by life's strand we'll clasp this glad hand Their children in a heavenly home